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Potto: An Anonymous Liar

Nigel October 10, 2024 Potto

Potto: An Anonymous Liar

– an “In My View” article by NIGEL WARD, celebrating the 10th October first anniversary of a libellous pack of lies uttered by a cowardly Potto Parish Council.

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Background

On Wednesday 9th October 2024, in honour of the fortieth anniversary of its original broadcast, BBC 4 re-aired the Channel 4 docu-drama “Threads” – a fictional prognosis on a potentially thermonuclear conclusion to the Cold Ward and its equally horrendous aftermath.

My most vivid recollection from the original broadcast was my somewhat forlorn hope that future public servants, from Westminster/Whitehall to the humblest rural Parish, would one day find it within themselves to set aside their ego-driven self-interest and act in the best interests of their masters – the public at large.

Presents events would suggest that my hopes were in vain.

Another Anniversary

Today marks the first anniversary of a 5-months-overdue (and hence unlawful) response (dated 9th October 2023) to a FOIA request raised by a member of the public (dated 9th April 2023), in which Potto Parish Council issued the following utterly false and libellous statement, highlighted below (and underlined in red):

When this disgraceful LIE (recently exposed in the six-page PKF LITTLEJOHN Audit Report [link] of 30th May 2024) was brought to the attention of the North Yorks Enquirer, the Editor emailed Potto Parish Council (on Tuesday 10th October 2023), seeking evidence of any inaccuracies, along with evidence (if any) supporting Potto Parish Council’s libellous contentions and, if not forthcoming, a retraction:

From: news@nyenquirer.uk <news@nyenquirer.uk>
Sent: Tuesday, October 10, 2023 11:01 PM
To: pottopc@btinternet.com
Subject: Accuracy at NYEnquirer
Dear Potto Parish Council

My attention has been drawn to your assertions about the NYEnquirer, as published on:

- https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/information_to_verify_if_the_17#incom

You allege “that the information published by North Yorks Enquirer is inaccurate”. As the Editor, I take great pride in publishing factually accurate and impartial data, in the public interest.

Please identify any inaccuracies, providing the correct details and adequate evidential support for your allegation.

I will ensure any necessary corrections are made and apologies issued.

Otherwise, please retract your libellous statement.

Yours sincerely,

Tim Thorne

On 18th October 2023, the NYE Editor received the following (barely literate) response from Potto Parish Council:

Subject: RE: Accuracy at NYEnquirer
Date:     Wed, 18 Oct 2023 10:56:54 +0100
From:     pottopc@btinternet.com
To:     news@nyenquirer.uk
CC:     pottopc@btinternet.com

Mr Thorne,

Thank you for your email, which was discussed at the October meeting of PPC.

Councillors were somewhat surprised to read your statement ” [sic]As the Editor, I take great pride in publishing factually accurate and impartial data, in the public interest” as it is clear that none of your articles published about Potto can be seen to be either factual, accurate or impartial. Your so called journalists have never sought to ask what the other side to any story is, 2which[sic] would enable them to provide the public with an impartial and balanced view, rather you seek[sic] to publish sensationalist story’s[sic] based on an unreputable[sic] based on an unreputable source with little or no factual evidence.

Therefore, in answer to your question, all of your stories about Potto are factually incorrect, and if NYEnquirer has any integrity you will stand by your statement ” [sic]I will ensure any necessary corrections are made and apologies issued.”

We look forwards to seeing these apologies.

Potto Parish Council

With considerable diplomatic aplomb, the Editor refrained from responding to Potto Parish Council with an appropriate reference to Arkell v. Pressdram [1971].

In point of fact, the public record confirms that the matter was NOT discussed at the October 2023 meeting; neither the Agenda nor the Minutes record any business on this topic. The Council’s decisions – that the NYE articles are “factually incorrect” – is not only asinine, it is also ultra vires – it is a sheer fantasy.

The fact of the matter is that Potto Parish Council has failed to identify even a single error in any of the NYE articles exposing incompetence and dishonesty.

I have also just found new data (excerpt below) on Potto Parish Council’s website, which I am sure was not published (as, by law, it must be) with the Annual Accounts – it has only appeared very recently, probably at the prompting of the External Auditor:

It would now appear – no, please allow me to re-phrase that – it is obviously the case that as each of the conceded ‘weaknesses’ identified above (having been investigated by me and reported upon in the Enquirer), that Potto Parish Council has now publicly admitted (however reluctantly) that everything alleged in the Enquirer is entirely true – which it is.

Furthermore, Potto Parish Council’s absurd assertion, “that that none of its policies and procedures were found defective”, has been blown right out of the water for the outright LIE that it is – and the Council has now publicly admitted as much on its own website.

Thanks to the diligent work of PKF LITTLEJOHN LLP, we all now know the truth – as conceded in the above insert. The Council’s email to my Editor was thus knowingly and deliberately deceitful – and the Enquirer deserves (but is unlikely to receive) an unconditional apology, for publication, from the anonomyous author of the ludicrous email reproduced above.

The North Yorks Enquirer had published, at the time of this exchange, a total of 22 articles about Potto Parish Council (by now, there have been over 30 – and the Enquirer will not cease publishing these exposées until justice is served and can be seen to have been served).

Common to each and every one of them – and contrary to the anonymous author’s claims – is the inclusion of innumerable items of evidence confirming the veracity of the author’s contentions. These items of evidence include, in the form of archived (WayBack Machine) URL-links, PPC web-site URL-links, screenshots, PPC correspondence, etc) irrefutable primary source evidence, including :

Potto Parish Council’s published Agendas;
Potto Parish Council’s published Minutes;
Potto Parish Council’s approved and published governing documents (SOs, FRs, etc)
External Auditor PKF LITTLEJOHN’s 22nd July 2022 Public Interest Report (identifying 17 Recommendations and a host of false Assertions made by Potto Parish Council in its 2021/22 AGAR/AGS returns);
External Auditor PKF LITTLEJOHN’s 30th May 2024 Audit Report (identifying another 6 false Assertions made by Potto Parish Council in its 2022/23 AGAR/AGS returns – see above);
Innumerable Information Commissioners’ Office (ICO) Decision Notices;
First-Tier Tribunal judgements and/or Substitute Decision Notices;
Upper Tier Tribunal judgements.

Yet Potto Parish Council (or whoever it is who presumes to sign off behind that corporate name) would have the Editor believe that each of these sources is “unreputable”[sic] – one can only presume the author, in her/his ignorance, meant “disreputable”.

In short, the 22 articles that collectivively vivisected the most corrupt and incompetent small Council in the country – as identified by Smaller Authorities Audit Appointments Ltd (SAAA), the body which oversees the auditing regime – are based entirely upon evidence sourced from official documentation; as far removed as possible from the “unreputable”[sic] source with little or no factual evidence” asserted by the half- or quarter-wit posing as ‘Potto Parish Council’, who lacks the courage or integrity even to put a signature to her/his libellous drivel.

In point of fact, FOIA responses should be signed off by the Council’s Data Controller (or the Clerk, or the Responsible Financial Officer, or the Proper Officer, or – at a push – the Chair), which narrows it down to two individuals – either the Clerk/RFO/Proper Officer, Mrs Joanne STOREY (the Chair’s daughter) or the unelected Chair himself, Councillor Andrew WILDE. (It is not as easy to identify which of the two wears the pants in that father/daughter relationship as it is to determine, with great certainty, that those pants are on fire).

There is, however, an interesting caveat to all this: I can find no evidence that Mrs STOREY was ever formally appointed as Clerk/RFO – and I have already reported to the Monitoring Officer at North Yorkshire Council that there exists ample documentary evidence to suggest that neither Councillor WILDE nor any of his ‘elected’ colleagues completed, in a timely manner, the legally necessary documentation (Declarations of Acceptance of Office) within the specified time-period around the May 2022 elections. This would mean that none of them is actually a Councillor at all – which eventuality may even save their rancid bacon (the Council can impose no sanctions on members of the public).

No matter. One does not have to be a Council to be a semi-literate LIAR. One might argue, however, that one would have to be a moron – or a sociopath – to believe one’s own lies.

[MEMO TO POTTO PARISH COUNCIL: Sue me if you believe you can prove me wrong – I double dare you! Few things, in a long and entertaining life, have pleased me more than watching liars squirming in the Witness Box, under oath, savaged by a relentless and well-briefed barrister. Come to daddy, Potto Parish Council – you pusillanimous LIAR!]